A Michelin star is an incredible honour, a rarified recognition reserved for only the best restaurants on the globe.
The Pine, an immediately beloved culinary destination in Creemore, has twice been bestowed one of only a small number of these awards handed out in Ontario. And the praise continues to come: it’s been included five times in the list of Canada’s Top 100 Restaurants and most recently, placed amongst North America’s best 50.
So where do you go as a relentlessly restless restaurateur after seemingly reaching the top of your profession? The answer is back to your roots, under the mountain, in the historic downtown of Collingwood.
LORE is the new project of hyper-talented husband and wife team Chef Jeremy and Cassie Austin. Located at 100 Pine Street, it brings them back to where their first restaurant began before finding its new home a few villages south. Last we spoke in early 2025, Jeremy was coming to terms with the enormous success of The Pine.
As much as that kind of international recognition is certainly a boon and a blessing, it also comes with a heap of new pressure to perform perfectly, perpetually. It seemed to me then that he felt a need to add something different – an opportunity for risk-taking, an unscrutinized outlet for unbridled creativity.
“Our goal was never to build a restaurant that burns bright for a few years and then fades away,” Jeremy tells me. “We wanted The Pine to become something that could be around for decades. To make that possible, both physically and mentally, we needed a second location. LORE gives us the flexibility to evolve.”
And what an evolution LORE is. Where their Creemore establishment is thoroughly informed by Jeremy’s travels through China, this Collingwood iteration is in conversation with our own domestic cuisine. “It begins with the waterways that shape Canada,” says the Philosophy section of LORE’s website. “The briny sweep of its oceans, the icy clarity of its rivers, the wind-brushed shores where land and water meet.”
Every element of this project is lapped by our nation’s connection to water, a mari usque ad mare, be it fresh, brackish, or salt. The light-flooded alabaster, wood, and brass room conjures cabin and sailboat — deck shoes on sunned teak. Scalloped white lampshades hang above a giant clamshell holding spent corks like a collection of pearls. The cocktail list features a briny martini spritzed tableside with oyster-soaked vermouth, as well as a seaweed negroni; for brews, there’s a refreshing Del Mare oyster pilsner from Meaford’s Lovebird Beer.
The menu card is churning with ideas and all over the chart like an intrepid seafaring explorer. Impossibly pretty Digby scallop ceviche is served alongside firm Sunseeker oysters from BC’s Desolation Sound in an east-meets-west, bed-of-crystalline-crushed-ice dream.
Juniper-cured wild salmon stuffs an elegant Montréal bagel-inspired handroll, dotted with an elderberry caper in a dollop of parsnip and chèvre cream. Golden brown scallop nuggets with smoked honey mustard and sundried plum jam recalls roadside clam shacks of Nova Scotia while winking at drive-thru fast food.
The “Foie Gras Beavertail” is a spiced and sugared deep-fried pastry under a scoop of rich mousse, offset by crisp Fundy dulse and tart dried cherry marmalade. It’s a contrasting ode to one of Canada’s most beloved unofficial national dishes that Jeremy says “felt essential from the beginning.”
Though LORE is purposefully casual, Jeremy’s painterly presentations here are every bit as on point as at its celebrated older sibling. Diners can order à la carte or choose to be led through a guided tasting menu; either way, every dish is thoughtfully plated and carefully composed. A filet of arctic char comes gilded in hollandaise, styled with scarlet striping, bejewelled with garnets of pickled beetroot, and garnished with emerald borage.
An intensely gamey Angus T-bone swims in a pool of sea snail goat’s butter, buoyed by a pair of lifejacket-orange and yellow nasturtium blossoms. If you order the honey garlic frog’s legs – and I sincerely hope you do – the whole hind parts sit in stately fashion like a gentleman’s pantaloons beside their accompanying ramekin of creamy black garlic ranch. Served with balletic choreography, the fare here is elevated yet playful, pushing boundaries with conscious approachability.
That approachability is essential to LORE’s purpose. “We take what we do seriously, but we don’t take ourselves too seriously,” says Jeremy. “I hope people leave feeling surprised by how much fun fine dining can be.” Especially compared to The Pine’s by now inescapable aura of haute cuisine, here it feels everyone can breathe out and relax their shoulders a little. The menu’s verbiage is plain and pronounceable, rife with colloquialisms and intentional misspellings (oysters come by the half or full “duhz”).
Those menu cards themselves are tucked into vintage, hardcover copies of 1970s “Foods of the World” cookbooks, filled with colourful film photos of folksy dishes and ordinary ingredients from all corners of the Earth. This makes both for something fun to flip through between courses, and a statement on the value of place, tradition, and everyday cookery.
Another brilliant facet of LORE is that this is a work of collaboration. Chef Evaristo Cajili comes to Collingwood after years spent in New Orleans, and he’s running this kitchen when Jeremy’s at The Pine, which is often. Bone marrow waffles with caviar, and chicken wingsà la royale – panko breaded and stuffed with juicy lobster and crab meat, in a Buffalo-esque fermented chili beurre blanc – harken to his deep south heritage; a deeply smoky eggplant omelette with tomato conserva proclaims his Filipino upbringing.
“This is comfort food,” Evaristo beams when I ask him what makes the dish so special. “This is food that reminds me of home.”
The menu is so packed with eye-popping possibilities (Snow crab potato salad? Sea smelt fish and chips? Beef cheek and Manila clam noodles?) that it’s difficult to concede to dessert. But there, at the end of the card, sits the ultimate item, coyly stating “there is only one so you may as well just get it.” Out comes a condensed milk soft serve sundae awash with warm kombu seaweed caramel. Another impeccable innovation bridging salty and sweet, land and sea, commonplace and conceptual.
A perfect punctuation on an evening dining experience with one of the most accomplished culinary teams not just in Canada, but as is increasingly being recognized, the entire world.
Written by Joel Loughead
Photos by Frances Beatty
